May in France seems to be just one long sequence of Bank Holidays! We sometimes wonder if anyone ever works during May. Firstly there is May 1st (Fete de Travail), then May 8th (end of WW2) and this year we have had Ascension Day and Lundi de Pentecote in May too. The French have a neat way of making these Bank Holidays into long weekends by taking a “pont” (or bridge day) if the actual BH is on a Thursday. So all in all we have had a lot of long weekend holidays this month. Not that I am complaining, mind you, as we have been very busy with B&B guests. It would seem that people are beginning to discover that this area is a good halfway stop when travelling from Paris, the north of France or Belgium to Spain or the south coast. Good news for us! We also profited from a last minute booking for one of the BH weekends which could prove to be a lucky break for us, as the young couple who came are involved with a drama school in Lyon and they want to use the gite for some theatre workshops next Spring. That will be interesting and appeals very much to my thespian background! I might even get a part in one of their rehearsals! We have also had a return booking for the gite from our friends the tri-athletes. A gite, it seems, of many uses!
Talking of the theatre, my trip back to the UK at the end of April reminded me of just how much I miss going to the theatre. I went to see my daughter who was performing with her opera group in a production of Orpheus in the Underworld. Even though it was just a small theatre it did make me very nostalgic. One day, I hope my French will be good enough for us to go and see a play here in France but we are not at that stage yet. The rest of the UK visit went well and I was able to catch up with the family and some friends too. I still do not miss driving on the British motorways though!
Continuing with the driving theme, I had the unfortunate experience of my first minor prang in Sauxillanges the other day. I was coming down the “main” street when this old guy in a “sans permis” car emerged from a side road without stopping and ran into the side of me. I was a bit incensed to then discover that it was all my fault ..”prioritie de droite” of course! Fortunately there was not too much damage done and no-one was hurt (well if you exclude my hurt pride that is!) and with the help of the local restaurateur who was on the scene we managed to exchange insurance details. Our car has scratches and a dent in the door and is now in the garage being fixed. The elderly gent’s car (which bore the sticky tape evidence of prior bumps) had a damaged bumper and sidelights but all is in the hands of the insurance people. It does worry me a bit though, that these old guys can drive until they drop, because unlike with a normal driving licence where the usual things such as eyesight checks are done when you reach a certain age, these restrictions don’t seem to apply to sans permis cars.
The Auvergnats have a bit of a reputation (a bit on the same lines as the Scots) as being very careful with their cash. I now think that we are turning into true Auvergnats (well Geoff is anyway!) as I have just spent a week restringing our beaded fly curtain ready for the summer. To say it was a labour of love would be a complete lie – it would have been much easier to buy a new one!
Finally, a mystery! We have been busy getting the garden up to scratch these last couple of weeks. I have been planting up the tubs and pots with geraniums and bedding plants and Geoff has been planting up his “potager”. Already the green beans look set for a bumper crop again (oh bliss, oh joy)..but I digress. We were inspecting the progress of the said veg patch the other day when we noticed that one of the little fir trees we had moved to that part of the garden last year, had completely disappeared. It had been doing quite well in its new place but now there was nothing to be seen of it – no branches, no stem and no signs that it had been dug up either. It has just vanished! That prompted us to check the veg patch and sure enough a lovely newly planted parsley plant had also disappeared. The next day the pepper plant had gone and one of the tomato plants. Our gardener neighbour, Paul, thought it might be rabbits but we have never seen rabbits here, as the ground is just too rocky for them to establish burrows and besides all the lovely sweet new lettuce plants are so far still there. And then again there is still the mystery of the fir tree – would rabbits eat that? So if any of you can shed some light on this please, feel free to post a comment. If it is rabbits, they better watch out as Geoff is a big fan of the Mr McGregor approach!